Omaha daily bee., 1887-07-01
Signed, Sealed and Delivered.

In response to the charge that the
award for city advertising was made by
the council on illegal proposals by dis.
honest trickery of the Rounds & TAYLOR
jobbers, their paper tells us that
their contract is signed, sealed and
delivered. This is literally true, but for
all of that, the contract is VOID, because
it was procured by trickery and fraud,
on an illegal bid, and furthermore, be-
cause the contract does not correspond
with the bid. The contract has been
"signed, sealed and delivered" but the
council has not yet taken final action on
it. Every contract signed by the
mayor must first be reported
back to the council with the bond.
1t is the duty of the council to compare
the contract and see that it corresponds
exactly with the bid, and if so, whether
the bond accompanying the contract
is good and sufficient for its enforce
ment.
We have already shown that the pro-
posals for advertising, as invited by the
city clerk, were in several respects de-
iicientt and at variance with the PLAN
provisions of the charter. Bids were in
vlted for printing instead of advertising.
They called for printing to be done dur
ing the fiscal year beginning July l,
1887, when the fiscal year begins with
January, and the charter, as construed
by the city attorney, requires the official
advertising to be let in January each
year.
But how was that contract "signed,
sealed and delivered?" 1t was presented
to Mayor Broatch early Wednesday
morning by Cadet Taylor, and the sigma.
ture of the mayor procured under false
pretenses. The contract is dated June
2Sth, although the mayor signed it on the
Goth. The object of back dating is mani
testify intended to make it appear that
the mayor had signed the contract on
Tuesday night, and the council had inn
medately voted to approve the contract
and the accompanying bond The back
dating is not, however, the only tell-tale
of deception, tiickery and fraud,
which appears on the face of the bogus
contract. The bid of the Rounds
q Taylor jobbers was for one
year, from July /, 1887, to July /,
1888. The contract reads for one year
from July /, 1887, to the first Tuesday in
JAN, 1888. The words First Tues
day IN Jan" are inserted in different
hand writing. Were they inserted before
the mayor signed the contract, and why
was this change from the expressed
terms of the bid made? Can any decent
man in the council stand up and approve
a contract which bears upon Its face the
stamp of iobbery and dishonesty? We
are not disposed to treat this matter
lightly because ii savors too much of
booiler methods. The contract has been
signed, sealed and delivered" but the
job is so bungling and the fraud so
transparent that 1t cannot stand.
The mere question as to which paper
shall be the official organ of the city for
the next six months is secondary in this
controversy. The main issue is, whether
the city council will recklessly counte-
nance joDbery and allow a gang of no.
torious swlndlers and confidence men to
fleece Omaha taxpayers? Mayor Broatch
also has plain duty to perform IN this
connection. He must rectifv the mistake
in signing a contract that is back, dated
and does not conform in its terms to the
bid under which the contract was awarded
by the council The bogus contract
should be cancelled promptly, and the
council notified of the fact that the award
for one year would be IN violation of the
spirit and letter of the charter.